Back in Sydney

Back to wonderful Sydney. Jobs interviews have gone well and full time work starts on Tuesday - working for a web agency. Looking forward to it.

We stayed for close to a week with our wonderful friends, Doug and Claudia, in Bondi. How we will ever repay them for their amazing hospitality, I do not know. They have made our settling into Sydney such a pleasure. Once again, we enjoyed the beauties of Bondi Beach in the sunshine - there's been a heat wave in Sydney so weather was perfect for walks.



Anyone seen my ferret? A sign in Bondi.


We left the comforting bosum of Bondi and moved to a short term appartment in Manly, close to where I will work. 30 seconds from the beach. Great waves for body surfing and endless coastal paths for rollerblading. Tough life in Australia!

Its going to be a bit of a culture shock when we try to buy a house in the future and need to move into the suburbian sticks with massive commutes!! But we are enjoying beach living to the max for now.


What a treat! We got to meet up with my friend and ex-colleague, Martin Palmquist, from Volvo in Sweden. He is here on a business trip and we got to see him in Brisbane too when he was there. Martin is a fellow blogger. We lay on the Manly beach, caught some great waves and then went rollerdlading. Great to see him - made me really miss all the Volvo folks. He brought some of my favourite Swedish candy (thanks for the suggestion, Caroline!) so I was in heaven.

Our first dinner party in our own place - ok, well maybe not qite a dinner party!


By the way, on the trip back to Sydney from Brisbane, we stayed in the Tally Ho Motel. Made me think immediately of Russel as this is one of his favourite Russel-isms. So there you go, Russel - Tally Ho is a place as well as a farewell greeting!

Stanley Park

Stanley Park is a beautiful park just a stone's throw away from Keira's flat in downtown Vancouver. Its got it all: beautiful beaches, dense forest, a hidden lagoon and great rollerblading trails. Had a very refreshing swim and we hired blades - Keira is as fearless as me on two wheels so we passed a lot of cyclists on the way down the hills. The park also has some stunning "rock on rock" sculptures to add to the ambience. How the artist manages to get some of the rocks to balance I'll never know.

Friday Night Skating

Ever since i heard about it, I've wanted to do the Friday Night skate throught the streets of London from Hyde Park corner to Picadilly and back. It is one of my life goals. 13 miles of exciting skating through streets that are normally packed with taxis and buses. Check out this video taken by a fellow skater. It captures the whole vibe really well.

Bridge Crossing

Crossing one of the bridges over the Thames. As you can see, it's getting dark. We left at 8 pm and the skate only ended at 10 pm. We did have a bit of a break at half time - much to the delight of the caffee owner at the spot where we stopped. He must have sold his entire week's quota of cool drinks in 10 minutes.

At the finishing line

Me at the end of the 13 mile skate. Sore, stiff ankles. More exhausted than i've been in a long time. Wet with perspiration. And totally exhilerated. Can't wait to do it again!

Skating over cobbles

I was very happy when Ally plucked up her courage and came out rollerblading with me. Not the easiest thing in such an old city with cobbled streets and rickety pavements... I've found a good, long smooth stretch (a cylce path) close to our flat. Ally did admirably well and enjoyed it tremendously. One of my goals for this year is to do the famous Friday night London skate from Hyde Park to Picadilly Circus (they close the roads specially) . Should be lots of fun.